The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth II

"The Battle for Middle Earth hardly anyone knows"

This Battle for Middle Earth focuses mainly on the wars the Elves and Dwarves waged with the forces of Mordor in the North. It explains a lot about why the Elves and Dwarves didn't really mingle in the original War of the Rings as displayed in the movies and books. To me, this game was a vast improvement over the original game, with loads more options, more strategy and more freedom.

Graphics:
Not revolutionary over the first game, but let's be honest, does every game need to be a revolution in graphics? The graphics have been buffed up a bit, but it's nothing really worth mentioning. The thing that will eat your computer though, is the vast amount of troops that can appear on your screen. I must say though, even though the battles are so colossal, they make little sacrifices in the graphics department and stay pretty organized and neat.
Even though the graphics aren't revolutionary, it's a great improvement over other RTS games and if you like to see a real war (thousands of soldiers clashing into eachother), this game is for you. For the Tolkien purists, this game's graphics will evoke mixed responses. It's really based on the movies and nothing has been left to the imagination Tolkien inspired.

Sound:
The game's sound is nice. Good, inspirational music that can really evoke the general in you, units moaning and groaning left and right and sound effects that are typical for factions (like the "Move, maggots!" from the Isengard Uruks). Overall, nothing to be unhappy with.

Story:
The story follows the Elven quests in the War of the Ring, during the time Frodo is taking the ring to Mount Doom. Explains a lot, not really much to say here without spoiling stuff. For the fans of the movies, this is nice, since it shows many of their favorite characters and characters that were referred to during the movies. For the real purists though, some things might not make any sense at all.

Gameplay:
Ahh...Here's where the game really shines. With loads of unit to pick from, every unit has their distinct weaknesses and strengths. A troop of cavalry will take down a group of infantry without blinking, but against a troop of spearmen, they're toast. It's also fun to see how every faction has their own unique set of troops with their own flaws and strengths. Elves can make light work of an enemy with their upgraded bows and stealth capabilities, but they're fairly weak in armor. That's how it is for all factions. Every side can have a Ring Hero too, which is Sauron for the bad guys and Galadriel for the good guys. You get the ring be finding Gollum, slaying him and bringing the ring back to your fortress, where you'll have to pay a whopping 10K to buy yourself a fancy hero. The price is high, but once you get one of those, GG.
The grand new feature in BFMEII is Create-a-Hero though. You can make your own hero for a faction and select his type, his gear (purely cosmetic) and most importantly, his powers. You can select an arsenal of great powers and you can build your own levelling structure. This way, a well-built hero can be extremely powerful and level an enemy's army in mere seconds. There's also a War of the Ring mode, in which you can play out a Risk like battle (turn-based) and conquer lands.

Online gameplay:
Pretty much the same. Great thing is, you can select your own hero, so everyone in the game has their own created heroes. This is very fun because it adds some extra depth to games. The community is fairly good, although can expect to receive a lot of nagging if you play Elves. Basically some people think they are overpowered, but if you use strategy instead of just massing troops, you will have no problems whatsoever. All in all, I'd say the developers did a fantastic job on balancing the factions. There's also a War of the Ring mode, but no one really plays that.

Overall:
One of the greats in the RTS department, IMO. Very accessible to all who wanna play something else; Tolkien fans, fans of the movies, fans of the genre or people who just want to play something else. Replayability is nice, and the online mode keeps it interesting. If you ever get bored with this game, you can just choose a new faction, create a new hero or practice one of the billion tactics you can think of for this. Coming from me, an 8 is more than an excellent mark, so there ya go.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 04/20/06